Page 6 of The Villain’s Fatal Plot (Gravesyde Village Mystery #1)

SIX: VERITY

Too many shocks in too little time left Verity unable to think. Instead, she fell back on feeble Faith and watched, with no notion of how to behave. While she sat there, her throbbing foot up, the efficient Miss Peniston and church ladies prepared Miss Edgerton for her funeral.

Miss Edgerton had always been a buzz of activity. Verity could not associate this lifeless shell with her beloved governess, but she said the prayers she’d learned after too many deaths. Maybe a lightning bolt would strike her dead and she would not have to worry about the morrow.

A world without Miss Edgerton’s wise guidance... She swallowed a sob of selfish panic.

Life as she’d known it these past years had been bleak and lonely. The one shining hope on her horizon had been her teacher, who was happy helping others as she’d helped the long-lost Faith. As she may have helped the new Verity... The world had lost its sunshine.

If only the foolish child she’d been had listened to her wise teacher, summoned the courage to abandon her father’s beautiful home to face the unknown...

Now here her adult self was, still lost in the unknown, although now she had no home or Miss Edgerton to ease her fears. She had the money, the security, she’d wanted to acquire, but cold coins did not warm her heart or buy courage.

Marmie deserted her to go in search of food or the garden. She couldn’t even name a cat properly. Male cats shouldn’t be called Marmie, but that had been what first came to mind. At least she’d known it was a marmalade cat. She wasn’t completely ignorant, but book learning only went so far.

A tempting odor of... cooking food?... seeped into the front room. She thought everyone had left, except the silent woman knitting in the corner. She didn’t know why the woman was here. Perhaps she should ask how she knew Miss Edgerton.

Verity had no particular desire to talk. That required thinking. Which required planning. She hadn’t the strength to start over, for the second time in less than two weeks.

Trying to determine what was cooking occupied sufficient cogitation. She hadn’t had a real dinner since... She didn’t want to recall those long-ago days. Belatedly, she realized life had passed her by. In the morning, she’d contemplate the horror of a funeral and where to go next. Right now, she possessed as little ability to fathom what was happening as poor Miss Edgerton—so she thought about food.

She clasped her shaking hands and closed her eyes but realized her belly was empty. When had she eaten last? Breakfast, a lovely porridge at the inn in Stratford. What time was it now? She opened her eyes again. The knitting woman had turned on a lamp. The days were growing shorter.

She didn’t think it possible to put a morsel in her mouth. Her tongue was dry and her throat had closed. She’d heard the whispers. They thought Miss Edgerton had been poisoned. That was ridiculous. No one poisoned saints. But she felt as if she’d been poisoned. What were the symptoms? How had her governess felt when... ?

Not thinking.

The big, ginger-haired man entered the parlor carrying a tray containing steaming bowls of enticing aromas. He needed a haircut and a shave. She couldn’t remember ever seeing a man with a beard. The carrot-orange curls stood on end as if he’d been running his hands through them. Attractive, in an odd sort of way. He was quite massive, barrel-chested and tall, but he carried the tray with deftness, arranging it on the table as he had the tea things earlier.

“Not much, just bean soup,” he announced to no one in particular. “There’s some apple cider. It’s a bit vinegary but I spiced it a little. The bread is old, but you can sop it in the soup. Tomorrow will be a long day, so fill up while you can.”

The knitting lady finished her row, neatly folded her work, and brushing down her skirt, stood to examine the plain fare. Without a word, she took one of the chairs.

If she didn’t have to talk... Verity did the same, without the knitting, anyway. She was exceedingly hungry. She shouldn’t be. She was supposed to be dead.

She didn’t dwell on that thought either. It had crowded in there unexpectedly. She sipped the hot cider to clear her throat. It didn’t seem vinegary but soothing.

The bread had been warmed and wasn’t at all hard. She dipped it into the soup and nibbled. When it didn’t come back up, she tasted the soup. Everything was so delicious that she couldn’t stop tasting. It had been so very long since anyone had cared to fix a meal for her... Tears stung her eyes all over again. She ought to be cried out.

If she died in the night, she’d almost go satisfied. Except, if someone had... simply not possible. Shut the mental door on that notion.

She supposed she ought to ask the carrot-haired man’s name.

She wasn’t ready to allow the world to intrude.

The meal refreshed her enough to recall all the women besides herself that Miss Edgerton knew and communicated with, women who would grieve as she was grieving. Verity knew how to be useful without a lot of thought. The other women were strangers, so she needn’t apply more than the formal words she’d learned after the deaths of her parents—the words Miss Edgerton had taught her.

Knowing her teacher would approve, Verity sat down at the spindly desk after she finished her soup. The chair was a bit narrow for her broad beam, but it didn’t creak when she sat. She’d seen people using the pen and ink earlier and saw no reason why she couldn’t.

She’d found Miss Edgerton’s address book by the time the man returned with tea. It was rather like having a butler. Since she hadn’t started frothing at the mouth yet, she trusted that the tea was safe. Or that she wouldn’t die until she’d finished the letters.

Her eyes were closing with weariness once she’d finished the final missive and realized the knitting lady had wandered off. She’d found the privy earlier, when the house had been full of people. Now, she’d have to brave the dark garden alone. Or go upstairs to the chamber pot in Miss Edgerton’s private quarters... She wasn’t ready for that either.

Folding the stationery, sealing it, and adding the final address, she added a black crosshatching on the edges so the recipients would know it was important enough to pay the postage. She didn’t think a village mercantile would carry appropriate funeral paper.

The kitchen had a small lantern burning so she didn’t bruise her shins crossing the floor. Realizing Marmie had abandoned her, she looked for the kitten and found it curled up on a towel near the heat of the hearth. The thoughtful orange-haired man must have done that. Could she afford a butler? She’d love to keep this one.

For the first time all day, she felt almost human. She’d prefer to retreat to frozen statuary, but she needed the privy first. Where had the strange man gone?

A crash and a curse from outside answered that.

Heart in throat, she held the door latch. Did she open it or look for a key to lock it ?

A hound howled. More crashing, at a distance.

Shaking, she pulled on a cloak left hanging beside the door and tested the latch. It opened. She peered out.

A lean-to covered the back step. No light illuminated the dark corners of the yard. But it wasn’t quiet out there.

She lit a lantern to see beyond the lean-to, but the meager light only illuminated the path to the privy.

A man’s voice murmured reassuringly, and a moment later, the huge gray hound loped into the lamplight, then vanished like a wisp of smoke around to the front of the house.

Now what? The garden smelled of unfamiliar earth. The impenetrable dark was too quiet, with none of the usual cacophony of city streets. A whole strange world existed that she’d never encountered and had no notion how to navigate. In London, she knew where to go, to whom she should speak. Here...

“It’s all right, Mrs. Porter.” The carrot-haired man approached, returning a sword to a scabbard. “Probably a thief looking to see what he could find.”

She’d have to grow accustomed to her new name. She almost looked over her shoulder for the stout old widow she’d stolen it from. Talking, she knew how to do. “Thank you, sir. People can be wicked. Stealing from the dead!”

“The dead limbs from that old tree should be cut out, but they served their purpose this evening. Might I help you?”

He had been so very courteous... “May I have your name, sir?”

He scrubbed his big hand through his thick curls. “Just call me Rafe, please. I’m not an officer anymore, and I’m not much of a mister either.”

“Oh.” That seemed odd. She didn’t know if she could do that. “Rafe? Is that short for Ralph?”

He sighed. “No, ma’am. For Rufus. I just wearied of the snickering when so-called gentlemen thought I was too stupid to know it meant red . ”

She understood senseless snickering. “Your parents must have loved your hair to name you so. My father told me that people who laugh behind one’s back are too rude to be acknowledged, and that I’m better than they. Which makes me better than most of the population, I suspect. It’s lonely at the top.” She offered a smile and walked past his rather stunned expression.

Could she do this? Could she become this Verity Porter she pretended to be? A widow with a modicum of wealth and no friends in the world?

And if Miss Edgerton had been murdered... Could she find her killer?

There was a notion she’d like to cram back in its box.

First, after visiting the privy, she needed to look for loose floorboards. She hadn’t told anyone about her teacher’s dying words. There was the reason she was trying so hard not to think.